Erik played smart, conservative and was able to keep some wounded units out of danger. He also shoot a lot - I can't find an explanation in the cards, as I don't remember complaining about them during the match.
Anyway, the final result is deceiving since I would have very good chances of winning the game the turn after. But Erik's last attempt with a 1-fig tank resulted in a blank+hit+retreat followed by armor overrun (2 medal objective conquered there) and another hit, to finish my 2-fig armor, providing the final medal.

Erik is a great player and a nice chap to talk to, who seems to have a very eclectic taste in music
Congratulations for the well deserved victory, surprisingly, the single one for the allies (it is a tough one for them, but I'd never thought it would come down to 7-1 for us the Krauts!)

Scoresheet/table has been corrected to 44 - 28, sorry for the calculating mistake.
And thanks to Tony for spotting it. (I concentrated on the individual scores to be correct and forgot to update the overall score.)

Thank you clorofila for your kind remarks. Finally the General is strengthening its back alas, for the team as a whole missed this opportunity. But we will be back in the next round with The Last Hollow Victory scenario to play.

This was the most exciting match that I've played in this tournament. Over 200 dice were thrown! John jumped out to a big lead, I made a comeback where I thought I had it won on my left flank. First, I thought I was going to be able to escape 2 infantry units but an armor assault with flag rolls stopped them cold. Later, a single stubborn Soviet armor unit thwarted my escaping 3 armor units. WOW! Then I thought surely he had it won,but a 1-1-1 card set up my victory on the next turn. The Axis extra artillery hit a single infantry unit for the win. In victory I was left with three single figure units.

Allies:

39 of 86 against infantry for 45%
10 of 21 against armor for 48%
1 of 2 against artillery for 50%
Totals: 50 of 109 for 46%

Axis:

26 of 69 against infantry for 38%
17 of 51 against armor for 33%
Totals: 43 of 120 for 36%

It was an epic battle with both of us having chances to win in the end...my persistence on the left flank finally paid off as Jeroen's cards ran out at the end. Well played and an excellent scenario from Eric (who I will get to meet in August ).

Indeed a very fierce battle, I started out well and was heavily in the lead. But then Geoff cleared my right flank and I got more and more cards there instead of where I needed them. So it got very tense in the end. In my last turn I positioned an armor unit for three dice on a three fig infantry, with a flag I could still throw two artillery shells at it, so I counted five dice. But I threw two flags and no hits in the three and Geoff could run away.

Great game in another great scenario by Eric! This was a very balanced match: 52%-55% inf 62-69 rolls, 42%-37% arm 24-19 rolls, 50%-0 art 4-0 rolls, overall 49%-51% with 90-88 rolls.
Played Air Power in 1st move (pointless; keep it for later, axis boys!), lost mobile arty in John's 1st move (Barrage), was unable to move ski troops to where we know they serve us better, was even unable to secure 1-medal objective due to lack of center cards in the mid and late game.
Towards the end, tried to move 3 units for the exit on axis left flank, but John had already earned too many medals at that point, it was too late.

Made a few mistakes, John made only one that I can think of. He played better and certainly deserved the win. Congratulations!

Great game in another great scenario by Eric! This was a very balanced match: 52%-55% inf 62-69 rolls, 42%-37% arm 24-19 rolls, 50%-0 art 4-0 rolls, overall 49%-51% with 90-88 rolls.
Played Air Power in 1st move (pointless; keep it for later, axis boys!), lost mobile arty in John's 1st move (Barrage), was unable to move ski troops to where we know they serve us better, was even unable to secure 1-medal objective due to lack of center cards in the mid and late game.
Towards the end, tried to move 3 units for the exit on axis left flank, but John had already earned too many medals at that point, it was too late.

Made a few mistakes, John made only one that I can think of. He played better and certainly deserved the win. Congratulations!

Better luck for the rest of axis team

You had me sweating when you got to within 2 medals of a win in the late game.

A heck of a game with your both sides right flanks suffering heavy losses - yours being wiped out and mine left with 1 tank in the end.

Yes, the link is worth at least a 1000 words!!! Enough said there!! Dugrim / Luca had the cards and played them well...as for me not being able to do anything...well...can't say I didn't try!!!

Just one of those games and Dugrim played it well given his hand and as any good player, played them to his advantage and thus the results were a deserved VICTORY for the AXIS...one more round for me in which to improve my ALLIED standing and hope to at least take BERLIN and get that satisfaction!!!

Bravo Dugrim and head up, forward march for me!!!! I await your next orders SAC HELCAT and will bravely fight on!!! Even if it kills me in the end!!

I met Jaykay on the field of battle, and my Germans claimed a close victory, 12-10.

I was loaded with Center cards, including an early Assault Center that ordered 10 units and did a lot of damage. I got an early lead, and held onto it, though the Russians staged a late comeback.

The Russians were unable to advance in the center, as critical hexes were controlled by German units. After turn 19, I led 10-5, because the Russians had temporarily left both medal towns, but a bit later they came back with their own Assault Center (4 units), which killed an engineer and my mobile artillery, and reclaimed both towns. However, Medics had returned my one remaining ski troop to full strength, and it killed an infantry in the upper left corner of the board, and then exited for the final medal.

I met Jaykay on the field of battle, and my Germans claimed a close victory, 12-10.

I was loaded with Center cards, including an early Assault Center that ordered 10 units and did a lot of damage. I got an early lead, and held onto it, though the Russians staged a late comeback.

The Russians were unable to advance in the center, as critical hexes were controlled by German units. After turn 19, I led 10-5, because the Russians had temporarily left both medal towns, but a bit later they came back with their own Assault Center (4 units), which killed an engineer and my mobile artillery, and reclaimed both towns. However, Medics had returned my one remaining ski troop to full strength, and it killed an infantry in the upper left corner of the board, and then exited for the final medal.

A fun battle. We didn't have time for a rematch.

Ah, 3-3 in points for the round, all these close battles makes my 12-5 thumping at the GREY hands of Dugrim look that much worse!!

Good game gents, funny how one card with 3 little letters, in the right section, can cause ALLot of damage!! Good start by Sam and nice comeback effort by JK2010, darn medics and Ski troops!!

A nice match very close against Lucky. I have began very strong with 3 kills in my 2 first turns. Then, the fight was more balanced with lots of casualties from both sides. All attacks made were counter-attacked by the opponent. Big suspens until the end...

Early battle cleared the Forest, Hitlerits attempted to break out on our right but were blocked, destroyed and given back.

Attack in the Centre made some intial progress but they were repulsed

We hold our positions and awaiti further orders

v V,

Nice victory and brings us to within one pt for the round, 5-4, now up to our glorious leader to bring it home and secure the last victory for the round against VCX1302 as we prepare to steamroll into BERLIN!!!

Except for my beatdown by Dugrim or for our game, "Gray Hand Luca" (Cool Hand Luke reference), 12-5, all others, if memory serves, at least 12-9 or closer battles for this round and WHEN SAC HELCAT prevails...the last VICTORY will not be HOLLOW and will set us on the road to BERLIN!!!

Great fun and EF coming to a close and looking forward the the PF, Imperial Forces of Japan and the Gung-Ho Marines, Semper Fidelis!!!

A thrilling match with Vercingetorix Starting with a strong centre attack, followed by a General advance; an infantry assault on his left flank and a General advance on his left flank brought the score to 6-4 in his advantage and the opportunity to walk through to the exits on that flank. I was luckily able to bring the score back to 6 all ad nibble a possible exiting piece of that flank. With a counterattack on my not so fine finest hour Vercingetorix was able to take two of my tanks for an almost free run to the exits. I judged that he would not have two cards left on that flank to manouvre his troops to the exit and opened the assault on his undeveloped right flank, trying to get as many points as possible before he would reach the exits. In a thrilling end game with two points to go, Vercingetorix needed two cards to be able to exit on that flank. Given the fact that he needed two points and two moves or kill two of my units, I decided to leave him with one target when I used my medics to heal two troops. I was lucky to get only one hit against my two figure infantry which meant that he still needed two moves on that flank. In the last turn I was able to get his last 3 fig infantry in the forest on the backline with 4 dices. Score 12-11 A narrow escape.

Sorry I needed some time for this round. End score 5 all if my math is still correct. As we cannot win the tournament anymore I would like to congratulate the German team with their victory. But, we can still take Berlin and that is what we will do.

Thank you, Helcat. You have been a gentleman and a good sport throughout, and your team has played an excellent tournament. Congratulations, also, to the Russian team for pulling out a tie in this round.

I've already done the pairings for Berlin, so as soon as you announce the Russian 2-point player, I'll post them.

I'm happy to see that this scenario had some really exciting matches. As we head into our final scenario I want to thank everyone for participating. It was a lot of fun providing you guys with as interesting scenarios as possible. It is tough to keep them challenging when you can't use all the newer units and rules. It must have been at least a little fun as I'll see most of you in the Pacific Theater tournament. Again, thanks for playing.

As a fascist state, Italy&#8217;s biggest enemy was Bolshevism, invariably depicted on Italian postcards as a monstrous subhuman. On this postcard entitled &#8220;Europe against Anti-Europe&#8221;, Italy and Germany are portrayed trying to protect the Virgin Mary and Baby Jesus. Note the halos around their heads. It&#8217;s a subtle attempt by the artist to depict the Communists as anti-Christian as well as subhuman.

The monster with the Hammer and Sickle of the Soviet Union at it&#8217;s feet is trying to break down the door of civilized Europe. Geared to create hatred and fear of it&#8217;s primary enemy, Bolshevism, it undoubtedly succeeded because of it&#8217;s directness.

Unfortunately, atrocities committed by the Axis were even more heinous than those committed by the Soviet forces when they invaded Germany late in the war. Rapes and murders of civilians were rampant on both sides.

Of all the nations in World War II, Italy frequently relied on Christian images to justify is cause, probably because Rome was the cornerstone of the Roman Catholic church
Ironically, during World War I every nation used the motto &#8220;God is With Us.&#8221; The message became lost after four years of bitter fighting and millions of deaths and injuries so in World War II it was seldom used.

Source: Propaganda postcards of World War II by Ron Menchine (ISBN: 1-58221-024-1)

And slightly related, some of you know I was in Germany for a few days. I also, briefly, visited this war memorial in Reisbach (a small town in Bavaria/Bayern:

If you look closely you can see that lots of these men died on the eastern front.

I of course was doing much more mundane things as in visiting small theme-parks and sommerrodelbahnen. To give you a taste here is a photo of me starting out on a "selbstbau" (self-made) rodelbahn. The gloves I am wearing were provided by the sommerrodelbahn so you could hold on to the side if needed.

Needless to say that this was the most out of control rodelbahn I did this weekend. The others were more professional. For the germans and Austrians out there: check out the Alpsee Rodelbahn. I normallly don't like the ones on tracks but this one was OK!